Gabriele Tarquini leads Honda 1-2-3 in Slovakia race one

Gabriele Tarquini has taken the first win for JAS Motorsport in the World Touring Car Championship at the Slovakiaring, leading from start to finish ahead of Honda team-mate Tiago Monteiro and the customer Honda of Norbert Michelisz.

Tarquini was unchallenged throughout the race, whilst Monteiro had to defend throughout with Zengõ Motorsport’s Norbert Michelisz right behind as well as Yvan Muller’s RML Chevrolet.

James Nash made a good start in the bamboo-engineering Chevrolet and was up to fifth in the early running, followed by Tom Coronel in the ROAL Motorsport BMW, who also had a great start up from 10th on the grid.

RML’s Tom Chilton, in his repaired Chevrolet Cruze, was in the wars early on in the race, first with contact with Fredy Barth’s BMW at Turn 3 and he then spun out of the race and into the gravel at Turn 6 on the second lap.

Rob Huff had a disastrous race in the Münnich Motorsport SEAT León WTCC, moving up to 13th with a pass on James Thompson on the second lap but then running wide at Turn 1 on the fourth lap, dropping down the order and could only finish in 17th position.

With three laps to go, Tom Coronel was able to pass James Nash’s Chevrolet at Turn 8 to take fifth, but Nash continued to grab sixth and the Yokohama Trophy class victory.

PB Racing’s Stefano D’Aste lost two spots in the late stages, passed by Proteam’s Mehdi Bennani for the final points position of tenth on lap nine and then lost 11th in a drag race with Wiechers-Sport’s Fredy Barth at the chequered flag, with Barth crossing the line just five thousandths of a second ahead.

Yvan Muller’s lead in the drivers’ championship is reduced to 21 points ahead of Gabriele Tarquini after the first race, with Michel Nykjaer slipping to third, 45 points down.

James Nash extends his Yokohama Trophy lead and moves up to fourth in the overall standings ahead of Tom Chilton after Chilton’s second DNF of the season.